1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to monitoring devices. More specifically, the present invention relates to a wearable health monitoring device for remotely diagnosing patients.
2. Background of the Invention
Visiting a doctor is often important to ensure the health of an individual, not only when the individual is sick, but also for regular check-ups. However, doctor visits can be costly, time consuming, and sometimes unpleasant. Many illnesses require constant visits to the doctor for monitoring. This monitoring may simply be monitoring an individual's blood pressure, determining if any changes have occurred, etc. Unfortunately, to receive this monitoring, the individual may have to drive a long distance, sit in a waiting room, see the doctor, and then drive the long distance home. This is not ideal, as it may end up taking most of, if not all of, the day.
Today there are many health statistics that are important to diagnosing the average individual. Besides statistics like pulse and temperature, muscular flexibility, hand-eye coordination, and basic reflexes are not only useful in everyday circumstances, but are indications of general health. However, since the enactment of The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), certain precautions must be taken to keep this information between the patient and his or her doctor.
When visiting the doctor, people often complain about past conditions or episodes. However, a doctor can only test the patient's current status and ask them questions to recall how they felt during the past episode. Patient accounts can be uninformative and unreliable. Patients largely do not recall things such as instant pulse, blood pressure, temperature, etc. For instance, a patient may remember feeling cold, which can indicate a high temperature, but there is no way for the doctor to determine the exact temperature or even if the patient had a fever at all.
Many individuals would much rather stay in the privacy of their own home. However, the cost of frequent house calls by a doctor or other health care professional is too much for most individuals. Thus, staying at home is currently not a real option.
IPTV is a system through which digital television service is delivered using the architecture and networking methods of Internet protocols over a packet-switched network infrastructure, such as the Internet and broadband Internet access networks, instead of being delivered through traditional radio frequency broadcast and cable television formats.
What is needed is a way to monitor an individual's health while the individual is at home or away from the doctor's office.